I saw my first women’s college basketball game on Friday. I really only went because a Norton contingent of supporters for our friend Rachel collected me. We played a good team that was nationally ranked last year, but it appears they aren’t now, because little old Case kicked their ass, something like 70 to 50.

I have played basketball 5 on 5 before, so I knew how it worked, at least I thought I did. The teamwork these girls had, the intuition that told them to be exactly where the other person needed them to be, was amazing. The fluid movements of not only the individuals, but the team as a whole were extremely well oiled. One girl in particular had the skills to drive in and make shot after shot, but she didn’t, because she knew that her making the point wasn’t as important as making the point in general, so she’d pass.

Having played hockey and paint ball I understand some of the people that play games. Some go for the glory of themselves, knowing that whoever makes the shot gets the glory. But others go for the glory of the team, and pass, or cover, helping the team being more important than getting a half court shot.

We watched a movie in evolution a couple of days ago on sex. Beyond the usual John Travolta and peacock scenes, it got to talking about different evolutionary changes due to sex, and the sexes. In chimpanzees the males are the dominant of the two sexes, and the whole species is violent, with the females being beat by the males in shows of dominance.

The Bonobos on the other hand, fairly close relatives to chimps, have the roles reversed. The females are dominant, and the whole species is calmer and much more cooperative. One interesting fact that was drilled into our heads during the video by countless scenes is the fact that Bonobos like to have sex. They have sex for pleasure, sex for food, sex for power, sex between guys, sex between girls, and sex with the kids hanging on the backs of the two lovers. This whole lifestyle has come about logically from the fact that they have more food, and less competition for it. The males don’t need to fight, giving the women who bear the offspring the power. The chimps must compete for food with gorillas, so they end up living in the food scarce trees, fighting for every scrap, leaving the women to fend for themselves AND their young. The fact that women tend to be dominant in one case and tend not to be in the other case came about due to evolution and the environment, not any distinct advantages of a sex.

If you draw the lines to human evolution, humans grew up on the plains, with the male hunters hunting for food and competing for the women. What evolutionary advantage could be better for a male than to have the females not have a choice on whether to mate with him or not? If he was big enough and mean enough, he could pick the woman he wanted and unless she could get away, there wasn’t much she could do about it. Knowing this, I am not surprised that the bias of the sexes has existed through the times. Given the current environment we live in, the most well suited male is not the biggest and the meanest (maybe for football), but someone more equal to the females. The real reason sexism exists today is that evolution selected for the biggest men who were the best hunters, and for the most caring women that raised the children best.

That’s just what I think, I could be wrong.

I may dream in Technicolor, but I trip the fuck out in old school black and white. – tandex@e2

There is a remarkable freedom associated with not caring. If you cease to care what others think of you, then no longer are you constrained by their opinions. These massive chains that have been around you neck are cut loose and you may act without abandon. On Saturday I went to my first nightclub / rave, a club called the Metropolis in the Flats of Cleveland. A local DJ warmed up the “crowd” (there wasn’t that many people there) before the headliner came on, a DJ from England. It was a new experience, and having been thrown into strange surroundings, my first instinct was to sit back and watch. Many other people were doing the same, to the point where for every person dancing under the spinning lights and strange effects there was three people watching. Standing on the side you feel isolated from the dancers, like you are an outcast that can’t walk into their world. So I walked forward. Into the center of the floor this newbie walked, until I was standing directly underneath the lights fantastic, and directly in front of the pair of van sized speaker sets. Once in the center, surrounded by swirling figures of people whom I have never met, I stopped caring that I was being watched. Freedom at any price they say. I found my freedom for $15 at the door and a $10 cab ride.

I have to start making that big decision: What am I going to major in? I’ve always wanted to do two things: program computer games, and build robots. Since I was in 8th grade I’ve made computer programs, although not as much in the last year or so. Last year I was in a school robotics team that made it to a national competition in Seattle, the highlight of that academic year. But I don’t want to spend the rest of my life behind a desk, writing code, or working on schematics. I take relief in my dad. He got two degrees out of college, industrial ceramics and a mining degree. He now is the president of a construction company that makes embassies, not exactly what he wanted or started out to be. He told me that regardless of what I come out of college with, I will end up where I want, if that’s what I really want. Your major will give you a general push, but its things inherent in you, your ability to learn and deal with new things that will ultimately decide your success. I am in college to learn HOW to learn.

That’s all I am. I stink. I have hair all over my body. I hurt myself on regular occasions by doing stupid things. I want things I can’t have, even though it should be obvious I can’t have them. I’m hungry almost all the time, and I eat what tastes good, not what’s healthy. I run from things that scare me, and I do things solely to impress others. I’m lazy, not wanting to do much more than I absolutely have to. I want to work just hard enough so I can feed myself and any chick monkeys I happen to have at the time, and trust me, as a monkey I like having chick monkeys running around all over the place. My goals are simple: have fun being me, cause that’s all I am.